Harvard University has been rejecting Asian applicants who have now filed a class action lawsuit against the university. The Justice Department has also decided to weigh in on the lawsuit. The lawsuit was filed by Students For Fair Admissions a group, which has been fighting for decades against discriminatory admissions practices by various colleges.
“Harvard today engages in the same kind of discrimination and stereotyping that it used to justify quotas on Jewish applicants in the 1920s and 1930s,” Students for Fair Admissions said in a court filing.
The Justice Department statement says, "Harvard has failed to carry its demanding burden to show that its use of race does not inflict unlawful racial discrimination on Asian-Americans, it uses a vague ‘personal rating’ that harms Asian-American applicants’ chances for admission and may be infected with racial bias; engages in unlawful racial balancing; and has never seriously considered race-neutral alternatives in its more than 45 years of using race to make admissions decisions.”
Harvard claims that they do not discriminate against any group in their admissions. Here is their official statement.
“Harvard does not discriminate against applicants from any group, and will continue to vigorously defend the legal right of every college and university to consider race as one factor among many in college admissions, which the Supreme Court has consistently upheld for more than 40 years,” the university said in a statement.
Attorney General Jeff Sessions had this to say. “As a recipient of taxpayer dollars, Harvard has a responsibility to conduct its admissions policy without racial discrimination by using meaningful admissions criteria that meet lawful requirements."
The lawsuit claims that Harvard holds Asians to a higher standard in its admission process than it does other racial and ethnic groups. It claims that they use subjective methods to cap the number of Asians that are allowed to be admitted to the school.
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